Now, in mid-August , the oriental lilies are blooming on DragonGoose Farm, spicily fragrant, and luminous and fresh-looking among the darkening, summer-weary foliage. The deer like them, a fact I've complained about bitterly in my previous essay, but I've managed to save quite a few of them by treating their buds with red pepper spray.

Or perhaps not, perhaps the deer decided to just forget the lilies and go on to the vegetable garden and nip off the new growth from the green beans.

Whatever, I've managed to capture a few lilies on film and also collect a breath-taking bouquet of them for the kitchen table. They last well in the vase and, given a pass by the deer, they last well outdoors -- at least, when the weather cools off, as it has for the last couple of days.

Lilies are nothing if not dependable and, given good drainage and afternoon shade (in this hot, droughty climate), they come back into bloom year after year, the Tiger lilies (Lilium lancifolium), especially, spreading into good-sized colonies.  Many lilies can survive up to Zone 3, and those I mention below are all hardy into at least Zone 4.

Planting and nurturing

Lilies appreciate a bit of bone meal added to each hole, and a good mulch cover is a must in Cache Valley's soil and extreme heat. This has been especially important in the recent drought years, for lilies need cool soil around the roots. I like to space the bulbs about six to eight inches apart and in groups of five or six for the best show. Lilies are not drought tolerant plants and should be situated where they get regular watering. On the other hand, here in Lewiston there are spots in which the ground water is very close to the surface. Though it's hard to believe in this fifth year of drought, there could very well be soggy areas in our local gadens and lilies do not like wet feet. Planting them near iris, also, is bad news as I've found to my grief. Iris spread their tubers through the soil aggresively, making at times an impenetrable mass. These masses can and do crowd out both lilies and spring bulbs, such as daffodils and tulips. Clay soil should be amended with compost to lighten it, and the bulbs given a little sand to rest on when planting.

Companions and Problems

To ameliorate the often awkward long-legged look of lilies, a companion planting of  groundcover or low-growing perennial is helpful, and it will also serve to keep the lily roots cool. Viola odorata (Sweet Violet) is a good choice, also the lower growing forms of Campanula, such as Campanula carpatica which mounds up nicely, and the varigated Lamium maculatum 'White Nancy.' This well-behaved lamium has neat, varigated leaves and white blooms in early summer. Chrystanemum parthenium (Feverfew) with its froth of daisy-like blossoms is an excellent fill-in flower under the taller lilies. It grows everywhere here on the farm and blooms continually when kept deadheaded, but it can reach to two or three feet high.

As far as diseases and insects go, I've found very little among the lilies growing here, though I've been watching them closely for signs of powdery mildew, a recent plague in the garden. Something is definitely eating holes into the petals of some of them, but the damage doesn't seem to be widespread and I don't mind sharing. But I have found it prudent to give each blossom a shake before bringing it into the house, in order to knock loose earwigs that hang out deep inside. The possibility of mosaic virus is very real, however, though I haven't seen any signs of it so far. Also aphids seem to be too busy with the plum trees and Red Boxelder to bother with the lilies, though aphids are said to be a problem for lilies elsewhere. I can only suppose lily leaves are too tough for strawberry root weevil and leafcutter bees, a small blessing.

I've already mentioned the temptation lilies hold for deer, but mice, voles, and gophers like them too -- that is, the bulbs. We have an battalion of cats around here, however, both tame (that is, they come daily to the porches to be fed and have been caught for the most part and neutered) and feral (the ones that stick to the fields and hills). If the cats fail us, though, we'll just have to start replacing bulbs. The only remaining danger to lilies occurs in the spring -- stepping on the emerging rosettes or, worse, hoeing off the tops that are just under the soil. Once the tops are badly damaged, there is no hope of a blossom that season. This has happened here over and over and over again, and not only by the gardening help, but by yours truly, the boss.


Types
Though we have some of the smaller, more delicate looking species lilies in our beds, most of our lilies now are hybrids of one kind or another. The hybrids have been developed mainly in recent decades and come with larger flowers and a wide variety of colors. There are obvious differences between the trumpet lilies and tiger lilies but the differences between Asiatic and Orientals are mainly times of bloom.
    Asiatics
Starting the lily season off in early to midsummer are the Asiatic lilies which have nicely open flowers and clear, bright colors. This is the biggest group of hybrids, the flowers four to six inches across, and facing up, out, or down. They have little or no fragrance, but multiply readily and are really easy to grow.

    Trumpets

Orientals are the last to bloom, 'Casablanca', shown at the top of the page being one of the favorites in this group. They are fragrant, some of them intensely fragrant, and can reach five to six feet in height. 'Casablanca' has blossoms that face out and down and are  about six inches across. I have six of the blossoms in a vase on the kitchen table which I can smell all the way in here, in the study.  As I mentioned is the previous essay, a large clump of these lilies disappeared into the gullet of a four point buck a week ago, just as I was walking out to photograph them.

    Tiger Lilies
Known as Lilium lancifolium, the Tiger lilies are my favorite, perhaps because these are the lilies my mother had in her New Jersey garden many years ago. This lily in fact has been cultivated for centuries in China and is a long-time favorite in American gardens. The stems are four feet high with up to twelve nodding, down-facing blossoms having recurved petals with dark dots. Orange appears to be the most prevalent and is my favorite, but there are many other colors available. Dutch Gardens  offers 'Lady Alice', which they describe as "a warm cognac gold," and 'Citronella', a bright yellow with generously freckled petals. I planted both 'Lady Alice' and 'Citronella' this spring and noticed that they bloomed a week or two before the orange. 'Citronella' has smaller blooms than 'Lady Alice' but they number up to twenty on each stem. Tiger lilies spread freely in all cases, though Dutch Gardens report that these last two varieties spread exceptionally well. We shall see.

Many of the lilies here on the farm are part of collections, with the varieties of each lost in the mists of time, but they are all beautiful none the less, and the orientals are holding their own right now ( by the grace of pepper spray) against the hungry deer.

Mid-August 2003

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